Janua ry 199B. H av ing spen t a ll our
time w ith Kelvin as ,1ctors (some five
years), we d ecid ed that we wo uld like
to spend some time on the other s id e
of the knce, creating and mou ld ing a
production, being the player ,1nd not
the ins trumen t. As close fri ends and
knowing our views and critics of
plays W,15 simibr, lVe dec id ed to
share the direction, h opi ng (perhaps
na ively) that this would lighten the
load.
Our desire was to d o so me thing
different, something tha t i;0t the heart
pumping and pro ved challen ging for
actors and directo rs alike. We both
love classical thea tre and looked to
J,1cobea n/Eli zabe th an wo rk a nd
plumped for Th c Whil e DClIii by Jo hn
Webster, a tra gedy in the true
mea ning of the word. There was a
little concern from some corners of
the club about the choice o f play but
we wa nted to prove that the re was an
a udience out there for this kind o f
theatre. TI1is was not going to be easy
with a cast of 25 characters to find , 30
cos tum es to d eci d e upon and
la nguage
requirin g
ca reful
consideration and interpreta ti on .
What had we le t ourselves in for?!

is he ld on trial by Camillo's uncle,
C'!I1.i inal Monticci so, for the death of
her husband, but is only fo und guilty
of being a n adulterer and sent to the
Hou se
of
Penitent
Whores.
Franscisco, the brother to Isa be ll "
begins his revenge on Ilr,1chianno for
the d eath of hi s sis ter, w ith th e
assis ta nce of Lod ovico, it villainous
Count who was in love with Isabella.
Tensions are high and fl"mineo kills
hi s ow n brother, th e vi rtuous
MiIl'cello, lea v in g hi s mother,
Co rne lia
distraught
and
she
eventually goes mad. Brachianno is
poisoned and Vi ttoria, her d ece iving
ma id Za nche and Flamineo all die a t

and so on and th is stood us in goo d
stead w hen we C<1me to mov<, the pla y
as characte rs were already real ,1 nd
d efined.
There are few morall y good
characters in th is Flay, Flamin eo
bein s particularly evi , hating wom en
ye t secre tly in love w ith his own
sister, bitter, twis ted and a d ream of a
pa rt. With out thi s character being
s trong the w hole play falls apa rt and
we were luc ky to have an experienced
actor to pl,1y this role, giving the
character not on ly underl ying evi l but
charisma, humour and aDove a ll
beli evabilitv.
O ur other leads,
Vittoria and' Brachianno, needed to be

Excluding the characte r work, we had
e ight wee ks of rehea rsa ls. In the ea rl y
stages we orga nised quick 20-minu te
warm up sessions consisting of
m oveme nt and games run b y the C,1st
membe rs.
This he lped wa rm
everybody up during those co ld
w inter
days
and
e ncouraged
everyone to ge t to know each other
a nd feel comfo rtable.
These
workshops got everyo ne in the mood
and the rehearsa ls in the main were
fun. Blocking was usua lly the most
frustrating a nd ti me cons uming, eve n
th ough most of the blocking was
worked o ut before h and , g iv ing
entrance s an d exits a nd any
impo rtant moves, the res t was
worked thro ugh with th ose at
rehearsals, ensurmg that a ll actors
were comfortab le w ith their moves
a nd to some extent the moves were
na tural to them .

October 1998. Our first challenge was
to edit the scrip t, as good as the play
\vas, it "vas son1 e four and iI harf
hou rs and the refore some serio us
edi ting needed to be d one. With
enormous help from one of our
m embers, a Webster buff, this was
achiev ed before the read-through
too k place.
Read- th rough and
auditions were se t for the beginning
of November (o pening nig ht being 3
March 1999). How many would
show up to the audition? \Nhat if the
rumours of uncertainty about th e
play were ri<>ht> VVere we to fall a t
the firs t hurtle? A couple tri ckled in
fo r tll e read-through bu t th en the
flo od ca me and nea rl y 50 people
turned up . Auditions turned o ut to
be grea t fun, w ith a total of 40 people
auditioning over 3 sessions. The
cas ting proved to be very hard but
once made our cast was an excellent
one, from the lead to the odd 5-line
character, not one wc,1k link out of a
cast of 20 (we d oubled up a few
smaller roles).

PLOTANDC~
The s tory revolve s around a famo us
and hi s tori c co urtesa n, Vittoria
Corombona, mill'ried to a path eti c
husbilnd, Camillo, who w as not as
wealthy as Vittoria has supposed. So
she begins an affair with a Duke,
I3rac hia nno who is "I so married, to
Isabella . I3ra chianno's secretary and
brother to Vittoria , Fla mineo ,
encourages the re lationship as it w ill
be finan ciall y to his be nefi t (so h e
believes). Vitto ria and Brachianno
plot to di spose of the ir spouses a nd
wi th the assi stance of Flamineo bo th
a rc murdered , Flaminco brea king
Cam illo's neck and Isabella be ing
p oisoned by the das tardly Doctor.
With us so far?
This an gers the famili es of the dea d
spouses and revenge ens ues. Vittoria

16

w as very memorable. CorneJia , was
virtuous yet forthright and gave us a
memorable and enjoyable mad scene.
Zanche gave a silent, brooding and
nas ty Moor w hose fac ia I ex pressions
clearly show ed the quic k a nd
mani pulative mind that lay behind
th e beautiful face . There were a
number of small pa rts a nd they were
a ll pl ayed w ith co n v ic tion and
commit ment even thou gh they we re
on for such a short time; there was the
mem o rable buffoon of a la wye r,
played brilliantly b y one of our long足
s tanding members and a new
member, femal e, took on a male part
as the son of Brachianno and Isabella,
giv ing us at the beginning a naive and
swee t-natured boy who grew up in
front of our eyes as he (she) mourned
the death of his m other - moving
stuff.

the sword of Lodo vico who is ta ken
away to torture and pri son for his
deeds - phew !!
Sha kespeare's infl uences o n Webster
are ve ry evident in thi s play with
clear references to the Three Weird
Sis ters from MaeiJel.iT, Ophelia's
madness in HamIel, and the charac ter
of Flamineo having ve ry clea r
influe nces from the chara cter of lago
in Olhello .
With the language difficulty, the
re la tionships
we re
not
instantaneously defined and before
rehearsals proper we spent a couple
of eve nings wi th cast members
di sc u ss in g their charac ters.
We
wanted everyone to fee l comfortab le
with w ho they were, what th ei r
chara cter was looking for, thei r
relatio ns hips with other characters

very strong a nd our Vittoria gav e us a
wom a n who was headstrong and
clever and o ur Brachianno ga ve us a
larger than li fe characte r with an ego
to match.
Our Fra nsc isco and
Monticciso we re strong a nd forceful
w ith s ubtle tension and crea ted a
grea t rela tionship between each other
as the ave ng ing fa milies. Su pp orting
characters
gave
LI S
exce ll ent
characterisa tio n with Marcello being
suitably vi rtll ous and Lod ovico
giving LIS a cla ssic ang ry, sexy yo un g
man, the p erfec t pirate Count. Our
Isabella was m od est an d ea rnest but
wi th underlying anger grown from
fru s tration of her circums tances.
Cami llo is usua lly cast as an older
man but we C,1St someone close r to
Vittoria's age and he ga ve us a sad
pathetic almos t nerd y character w ho,
although only on stage a short time.

Extra, more rigid, blocking was
requi red for so me scenes, the dumb
show showing the deaths of Ca millo
and Isabe ll a, the death of Brachianno,
the cou rt scene and the deaths of
Camillo and Isabella, the d eath of
Brachiarmo, the court sce ne and the
d ea ths of Fla min eo, Vittoria and
Zan che. The dumb show was set t(1
music a nd h ad to be compJe teh
choreographed and th e actors were
excellen t a t taking instructio ns and
carrying them out without ques tion
How ever, naturally some qllestionin ~
from cast took place and we a lw ar '
spent tim e di scu ss ing issues and
co ncerns ens uring the actors felt
co mfortable . There was hardly am
moment w hen we had to pull rank a"
di rectors, which was grea t m足
everyo ne was therefore com mitted I.
w hat th ey were d oin g a nd thi ,
s howed in the final week.
We found ourse lves continuing to u .
the script throughout reh ear""l,
w hich was frustrating for some of I
cas t as they ha d lea rnt their lin
before rehearsals eve n bega n. Tr.
cast co ped well with the lanllu '"
and ab und ance of m oves ,1I1d I
rehea rsals were all in all, 10 0
back. th e most enjoyable tim
wh ole produ cti on.

(I'

Another rath er technica l arei!
play was that o f sword fightin"

---¥ PRODUCED

eI'C lucky tha t two ()f our cas t
'- "pericf1ce in this orca and
c
ril phed the fights for us, using
. ' wood until a week before the
when we were able to get ho ld
'" >words. The fi ghts, particularly
One in w hich Fbmineo kil[s
larccllo, were hear t stopping st uff
n worked well with the audience
1\ ing evcry minute of it.
O ur p [,111 to split re hearsa ls between
.1< did not pan out since once the play
'~iln and adrenaline pumped, we
bo th w,lnted to be a part of it a[1. It
W itS wonderfu l to see t[1(' whole thing
orne to life a nd we weren't going to
li"s ,lilY of it. We ended up making
nluch 1110re work for ourse lvC's (lS v\'e
\ \"cre in~ist(:'nt on no t makin g any
d~ cisions

alone, the'y had to be joint

'::'-0 W~ spe nt cl lmost all our tim e on the

ph one or meeting for lunch to discuss
the p[ilY and ilny probl('ms or issues,
The time tha t co-directing worked in
Oll r favour \NaS \.v hcn one of us \-vas

taken ill and the other WilS still able to
be at re hearsa ls, en s uri ng that things
moved fnnvard.

Our set was spli t level ilnd raked.
Wi th the assis tance of our extremel y
artistic and clever stage d eS igner, Doc
Co [liel~ we used up pretty much the
whole stilge, We ha ve neve r seen the
Redgrave st,' ge look so big. Both of
us dis like the usc of huge flats, they
mov e ilnd block light and so we
dis pensed with this notion s tra ight
ilway. We created a three dimension,ll
feel w ith the sp lit lev ds and rilking.
We had a high stag ing M ea at the back
with [Mge s teps to centre stage.
Down each s ide of the s til ging area
\'\fere raked 'nnns' \<\rhich were placed
in an arc sha pe each side, a bit [ike
pince rs of il crab. The back area was
over six feet high wi th the 'claw' ends
of the rake being only 6 inches high.
To brea k this up we had large red
curta ins fl own in which co uld be
pulled up to produce an awning or
left down creating two red columns
cutting direc tly through the set.
In order to represent the chilos of this
play, the w hole construction of the set
was angu lar and off line, no thing
mll tched, each 'arm ' \""llS il diffe rent
leve [ and th e curtains were of
diffe ring heights.
The set was pa le gre'y splattered with
g ree ns, blu es, blacks and dMk greys.
The colouring proved very difficult to
get right; we wanted the paleness to
accentu a te the corners and a ngular
shad ows created by the se t but we
didn't want it too dark as then the
lig htin g would be needed to be bright
- this was " dilrk play' It took two
days to get the colour right and we
thought it wasn 't going to dry at all
before opening ni ght. To finish off the
colour we sp lashed deep red pain t in
the three sp ots where the deaths
occur. We did co nsi de r us in g rea [
blood during the death scc nes but it

prove d difficult due to hire
regulati on s for th e costumes "nd
therefore we wen t on representation
instead, The blood sp lashes were on
stage th e whole time and toge the r
with the curtains, it gave a foreboding
sense of doom before any actor had
even ste pped on to the set.
A[though tile' set was s imple we did
have oill' tec hnicality to overcome,
th(' appearance of ghos ts. Lighting
obv iou s ly was to playa part, but the
light had to be an up[ighte r <lIl d
therefore we needed a g rill or a trilp
d oo r built into th e set. Our d es igner
ca me lip with a silen t trap door which
was pulled back in a blacked out area
of the stage jlls t before the ghost's
entrCl nce so no audience membe r
noticed it until the light hit the ghos t
with classic smoke and eerie music.
We were very kee n th " t the sight of
the ghost would not be too hammy
and with the excellent technica l s kills
of our se t ,lnd lighting d esigner, the
ghosts proved to be w ry e ffective and
atmosphe ric.

...

We wa nted a ve ry minimal set and as
few changes as poss ible so the use of
furniture was kept to a minimum.
. However we co uld not cut corn e rs on
the look of the furniture and with the
help of the Bristol Old Vic Prop s
d epartme nt our furniture was a ll
reprodu ction Jacobean which worked
we ll. We struggled w ith o ur bud ge t
he re illld could not a fford a 11 we
req uired so for the co urt scene we
used repro furniture for the chairs but
did not know what to do for a tab le at
which Monticelso and Franscisco sat.
One night, in a fit of Carol Smi lie from
Changing Rooms, we grabbed one o f
the club's trestle tables , ,lnd a couple
of o ld velvet g reen and rcd curtain s
and went wild with a s taple gun and
a very convincing, courtly table WilS
p roduced - amazing what Ciln be
don e w he n time and mo ney a re
running o ut'
Props again required authenticity
w ith sword s, da ggers, pistols and real
flame torches, again the Bris tol Old
Vic came u p trumps here, We also
need ed books, quills, p oison bottles,
masks, candles etc and the cas t and
crew came up trumps digging deep
finding u s vc ry authentic looki ng
item s.

COSTUMES
INc were lucky to have an excel[en t

costume ma nager, Graham Ecck-s,
who has studied fashion and was ho t
on ""hat was Clnd \vas no t JacobeC1 n.
Costumes were the largest part of our
budget as we wa nted them to be spot
on and who else can you go to for tha t
but th Roya l Shakespeare Company
in Stratford.
When Gra ha m
telephoned them and ad vised them
that IV<' were d oing Th" While D(>vil
th e ir comment was 'gos h, you're
b rave' - thi s would be very true in
weeks to come.
However, wi th Grahclnl, we s pen t
two Saturdays ilt the RSC meas uring
and choos ing nea rly 30 costumes. It
was wonderful fun, particu larly
w hen you found cos tumes be longi ng
to the likes of Sian Phillips, Charles
Dance and Bri an Blessed.

One snag was that we seemed to have
CilSt the most voluptuo us actress in
Bristo[ ,l nd many of the cos tumes
were too s mall in the bust, but a ft e r
much
searchin g
("nd
som e
squeezing ) we found w hat we were

SEPTEMBER

loo king fo r an d they loo ked
wonderful.
By luck r"th e r than
judgen1cnt
\ve
nl.,ln(lged
a
go ld/red /b lack and brown theme
which matched beauti fu[ly with the
set. The cast tho roughl y enjoyed
w ear ing the m, particularly the
Cardinal w ith his ski rts which he
sw is hed Mound as if he had been
weMing them all his life (we' re sure
there is a s tory there') . It was at this
point that both us began to envy the
cast but we cou ldn 't d well for long as
by this time the costumes were read y
we were in the clos ing furlong.

These went very much together and
we were luck y to ha vE' a very
experienced lightin g des igner, Andy
Bromsgrove, and were approa ched by
a mu sic student from the University
who asked us if he co uld write our
music for us. We wanted a very
vis ual and atmosphE'ric lighting a nd
so und plot and we tllercfore used
many effec ts and cues. The technical
crew nearly ran from the theil tre
when we told them that the re were
150 cues. Our s tage manager went
visib ly grey at this point bu t when We
saw the li ghting come il live on the
dress rehears,, [, the operators in the
box forgave us for the stress we put
them th.ro ugh.
One of the mai n the mes was the
rep resenta tion of death and as said
e~ rlie r we had dispe nsed wi th the use
of rea l blood by actors so added to the
blood red paint across the s tage, we
used red fla shes of lig ht w hen each
person died. With the p" le set and
dark
costumes
it
wo rked
wonderfu ll y.
We used stark lighting for the scenes
in the house of convertites and pale
s traw coloured lighting for daytime
scenes. Blues illld greens were u sed
for scenes at ni g ht a nd And y
provided us w ith a wonde rful
w indow gobo [it on the cyc and the
fl oo r fo r the co urt scene which was a
v isually stunning des ign.
Music was intermingled in be tween
all of this i1nd was very importa nt
durin g the dumb show which had to
be sct completely to music. The use of
li ghting was also very important here
a nd enhanced the ominous mood of
this scene. We also used a stacato
li ghting e ffect for the d ea th of Camillo
as he was pushed from the steps to
his death by Flamineo - the actors
moved in a black o ut and stood
stationory when the lights came up
crea ting a s low motion effect, added
to this was the ominou s sou nd o f
drums beating and it required preci se
timing from technical and acting crew
alike. We were very pleased with the
dfeoct throughout.
Sadly our musical composer was no t
able to give us all the music we
required (we were very d em"ndi ng)
so we chose Mmospheric mus ic from
Adcimus and Va nge lis in addition to
that w ritten for us. We on ly had two
so und affects bei ng bells and the gun
shot from the pistols. The bell sounds
ca me co urtesy of th e BBC sound
librMy. We co uld not fire the guns
producin g the smoke which would
ha ve been authentic so we aga in
reverted to representational light ing
with a quick fla s h o f stark w hite light
cued with th e sou nd of the gun shot­
it proved very e ffective.
Although the outcome for lighting
and sound was good it did no t come

with some cons iderable heartache .
The technica l rehearsa l neve r really
hilppe ned, al tho ugh we were there
w ith the technical crew all day in
read iness for the ca sts arrivill, we hild
trouble w ith the curtains, the lighting
plot took longer th an planned and the
sound plot wa s still not sta rted by
9.00 pm (t his fin a ll y bei ng compJeted
at 4.00 am in the morning). We
th erefore abandoned a tech nical
rehearsal and had to do a tech and
dre ss togeth er w hich was rath er
worrying as we had very little tim e to
correc t anything whi ch didn't work.
Lucki[y it a ll slotted into p lilce
beautiti.llly.
On the whole w e were very happy
but the re we re a couple of sound cues
that d id n't work iln d we rea lised that
we should have plotted th e so und on
two minidiscs ra the r than one so that
cues co uld fad e in a nd out more
smoo thly. H owever, the final plots
for both worked very well and
provided us w ith w hilt we wanted, an
om inou s an d ten se a tmosphere,

PUBLf,CITV
Thi s producti on we knew would
prove to be more difficult to sell th at
o thers that Kelvin had produced as it
is no t that well known and we
therefore pul[ed ou t a [[ the s tops.
Luck w as on our side as the build up
to the week of the run co incided with
Oscar nom inations for Shakespeilre In
Love, In the film , John Webste r (our
playwrig ht) "ppears as a characte r,
and thi s link brought us two radio
intervie ws and a slo t on the BBC's
loca [ nigh tly n ews. We also managed
a large front cove r picture on a small
loca [ pape r and a nice piece in the
Bristol Evening Post, the paper
covering the entire Avon and
So merset area . This proved to be very
effective w hen we began counting the
heads in the auditorium every night.

CONCL SION
Th e White Devil turned out to be a
mammoth production w ith a la rge
cas t and a very technical lighting and
a udio plot but when we sat in the
auditorium on th e firs t ni ght and
watched it, we were d eli g hted .
Audi ences were heard in the intervill
and after the s how ques tioning
w hether Kelvin were il professional
compa ny and p ra isin g the choice of
pia y as well as the prod LLction itself
and ·this was mos t sat isfy ing. There
may have been a co up le of tears a nd a
moment during the final stages whe n
we wondered wha t on earth hild we
started but.. in th e end it was
wond erful, the acting, the lighting,
the cos tumes a nd of course the
audi ences reac tion. It was a tota [
team effort from the beginn ing to end
"nd by the end, alth ou gh we were
thoroughl y ex hau sted we were
delighted that it had gone so we ll and
that thi s brillian t b ut sadly rare
performed play was able to be seen
and enjoyed by so ma ny.